


Perfume

by Bleck



Category: Animorphs - Katherine A. Applegate
Genre: Being Triggered, F/F, Nonbinary Tobias, Past Child Abuse
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-07-01
Updated: 2017-07-01
Packaged: 2018-11-22 03:54:37
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,076
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11372046
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Bleck/pseuds/Bleck
Summary: Tobias gets an unhappy reminder of their aunt.





	Perfume

"Ugh, no way." I said, attempting a frown. I'm not sure it worked but Rachel got it. Rachel had taken me out for lunch but now she was focused on sampling perfumes. She'd been trying to find a good one for a few minutes with no success. It was kind of fun, most of them smelled good and most time with Rachel was great.

"Alright." She said and looked for a new one to sample. Rachel spritzed some on a testing strip and sniffed. "Hmm. Tobias, try this. It smells really good." 

I walked over and she spritzed the strip again. A hint of vanilla but mostly mint and orange. The stench was awful, almost as bad as my uncle's bud ice. "No." I choked out, shaking my head. The fear hit me like a bus. I wanted to puke. I knew she wasn't in the store, she was on the other side of the country for Pete's sake, but that didn't stop me from looking around for her. My aunt. No, no, no.

"Tobias?" Rachel asked. She was right next to me but her voice sounded muffled, like there was a wall between us.

"I think I might puke."

Rachel helped me run into the nearest bathroom. I dropped to my knees in front of the toilet before she could even close the door. Nothing came out except angry hiccups.

"I'm going to get you some water in case you puke, alright?" Rachel asked.

I nodded since I wasn't sure I could actually speak without crying. Why'd this have to happen? Why now? We were having a good time. I hadn't even seen my aunt in months. Barely even thought about her in months. Smelling her fancy date perfume shouldn't have mattered. Another wave of nausea hit me as I thought about what that meant. How cruel she was before she brought someone over, how perfect I had to make her house and what she did if it wasn't "positively gorgeous". It never was good enough.

I dry heaved but nothing came out. Still gross. Not even the smell of cleaner helped get the perfume out of my nose. I shuddered. Rachel came back and sat down next to me. She rubbed my back for a while and waited for me to puke. 

"I think I'm ok now." I said after at least ten minutes with nothing happening.

"Are you sure?" Rachel asked.

"Not...not entirely but close enough." I said.

She didn't look very convinced. "You should drink some water anyway."

Rachel handed me the water bottle. Even though I hadn't puked, the coolness of the water helped a little. 

"What happened?" She asked after she deemed the water sufficiently drunk.

"I'm not sure. The perfume it... it reminded me of...of my aunt." 

"Tobias, I'm so sorry." Rachel said, looking like she was about to cry.

"You didn't know it was going to happen. I didn't know. It's not your fault." 

"I know that. It's your fucking aunt who's at fault. I hate her so much." Rachel said, not quite snarling. For my benefit. She brought my head to her shoulder and we both moved to get more comfortable.

"I know." I said. Any conversation about my relatives was awkward but especially so with Rachel. Everything I said about them just made her more upset which was lame for two reasons. Firstly, the only two responses she had was pity and the desire to rip their throats out. Neither of which I wanted. Secondly, it somehow always managed to happen when I was in human morph and we didn't have a lot of time to spend talking about stupid stuff from the past.

Well, it was usually in the past.

"I'm sorry." I said.

"You don't have anything to be sorry for." Rachel said as she stroked my hair.

"I think I do. It's just perfume. I don't know why I reacted like that." 

"It's called a trigger. Something that triggers a huge reaction. Or something. Like wanting to puke or looking around for threats." She explained.

"It was my aunt. I was afraid she'd be there. Which is stupid since I know she wouldn't be." I admitted. I couldn't tell if I felt better saying that or not.

"It's not stupid, Tobias. It's a sign of trauma. We've all been through a lot of shit as the animorphs. But you've been going through awful shit for a lot longer. It's ok to be affected by things. It's literally how we survive." Rachel had clearly done research.

"But this never happened before. When I was there." I said.

"It's delayed. That's super common. It's, like, your brain at the time was just trying to keep you alive and as sane as possible. But it remembered that the perfume meant something bad and did...that to get you away from it." 

I didn't have anything to say to that and Rachel didn't have anything else to add. We just sat there, in a bathroom, until I had to demorph. For once, the grossness wasn't all that bad. I didn't morph back for a few more minutes and by the time we left, we had probably spent half an hour in there.

"What do you want to do, Tobias?" Rachel asked me as we walked. We still had a few hours until Rachel had to be back home.

"I'm not sure." I said. I had never really been anywhere in the mall besides the arcade. I've been to the mall more with Rachel in the past two weeks than I normally went in two months. I've seen more of the mall today than I ever did before. We walked past a couple stores which made me feel awkward. They were the ones I had noticed...during Rachel's gymnastics competition. I didn't really like thinking about it. 

I stopped outside of Express. "Um, i've never actually been clothes shopping before. Moving past that, if you wanted to buy me a dress then I wouldn't be opposed."

Rachel frowned then smiled. "I'm not ignoring that first part but I would absolutely love to buy you a dress. I've known Cassie for years and she has never once bought a dress with me. I don't think she even owns one. This'll be great, I promise." She started to happy flap and I couldn't help but join in.

I loved spending time with her. I loved her so much.


End file.
